Frédérique Hamel, known to most as Fred, and her brother Christophe, were highly energetic kids growing up in Quebec City. Their mother, a college athletics teacher, heard about a new circus school for children at the Circus School of Quebec and signed them up. Fred started circus at 7 years old and hasn’t stopped yet.

After graduating from the professional program at Circus School of Quebec at 18, Fred’s skills on the trampoline-wall, her unique aerial net act and acrobatic abilities allowed her to see the world from the circus stage. Recently she worked closer to home in Crépuscule Vents et marées, a production by FlipFabrique, a company co-founded by her brother Cristophe. Keep an eye out in the trailer for 2017 Midnight Circus alumni Adam Strom and Sidney Iking Bateman!

We caught up with Fred while in production for her most recent show Truck Stop by Machine de Cirque. “I am so looking forward to joining the Midnight Circus troop for the 2018 season,” said Fred, “It is circus for all of the right reasons. Helping communities, an intimate ring, one of the most beautiful things you can do with circus.”

Another reason Fred is excited about coming to Midnight Circus is she knows and has worked with a number of the artists joining her in this season’s tour. “The skill and technique of the artists I’ll be working with at Midnight Circus is very high. It makes me feel that the energy will be very strong. We will challenge each other to bring our best for Chicago.”

Fred has performed around the world from South Africa to Turkey, Oman to Finland and throughout Europe. She has only passed through Chicago briefly two times, once last year to visit her friends in the 2017 Midnight Circus Troop from her gig in Kansas City. “I’ve always wanted to experience the city of Chicago,” Fred enthused. This August Frédérique Hamel will join 18 other world-class acrobats and circus artists and get to see neighborhoods across Chicago from Englewood to Oriole Park experiencing the city one circus at a time.

For more than a decade, Sam Brown–with his big hair, cigar box ukulele, and infectious smile–has been a beloved fixture of Midnight Circus. In fact, other than the Jenkins family, he’s the only performer to be a part of every Midnight Circus in the Parks tour.

Book says he creates material by taking into account every element of the performance–setting, music, costume, etc., along with whichever skills he wants to feature. Usually his knack for physical comedy wins out, says Book. “Ultimately, the material needs to serve my passion for acting like a goofball in the circus ring,” he says.

Frédérique Hamel, known to most as Fred, and her brother Christophe, were highly energetic kids growing up in Quebec City. Their mother, a college athletics teacher, heard about a new circus school for children at the Circus School of Quebec and signed them up. Fred started circus at 7 years old and hasn’t stopped yet.

At just 3 years of age, Maxwell Jenkins stepped into the Midnight Circus Ring. His feet were so small then, that both of them fit into a single hand of the Ringmaster (his Dad) as he precariously raised Maxwell high over his head.

Sidney ‘Iking’ Bateman is not only an extraordinary circus artist but also an extraordinary human being. Sidney was born in North St. Louis, an area he describes as worse than Ferguson – the neighborhood brought to national attention by the protests that followed shooting of Michael Brown, an unarmed black teenager by a white police officer. Sidney is one of eight siblings who grew up doing flips in their back yard – a family tradition he shared with his brothers and uncles.

Regina Meirmanova was born to be a circus star. Her father Nourbol, from Kazakhstan, studied at the world-famous Moscow State Circus School. When he graduated in 1980, his first professional gig took him to Orenburg, Russia. There, he met Svetlana, Regina’s mother. As Svetlana tells it, she was working in a store. It was her first day on the job after graduating from college. Nourbol walked in, pointed to her and said, ‘she is the one.’ A year later, they were married and touring the world as circus artists.

Justin Durham started his journey to the circus at the ripe old age of 3. His mother, an administrator at Evanston hospital simply couldn’t get Justin to stop climbing, well…EVERYTHING! So she did the next best thing and channeled all that energy and talent into classes and camps at the Actor’s Gymnasium.

Patrick Tobin hails from a tight knit Boston, Massachusetts’s family. His father is an Engineer, his mother an Elementary School Principal, and his two brothers are studying to be an accountant and engineer respectively.

So naturally Patrick Tobin…or as we call him PT…would end up being a Tight Wire Walker in the circus!